These
analyses examine the effects on home smoking policies of a
behavioral counseling program for reducing babies' exposure
to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS). One hundred and eight
smoking mothers were recruited from WIC sites. Mothers' mean
age was 28.7 (SD = 6.7). Babies' mean age was 14.2 (SD =
6.9) months. Almost half (47.2%) of mothers were
non-Hispanic White, with 27.8% Hispanic, 21.3%
African-American and 3.7% reporting mixed-race or
other.

Mothers were randomly
assigned to a usual-treatment control group or a counseling
group that received seven sessions over three months.
Contingency contracting, shaping, and stimulus control were
incorporated into individualized sessions which encouraged
mothers to decrease their childrens' exposure to ETS.

Of 38
mothers who reported no baseline restrictions on tobacco use
in the home and had follow-up data, 60.0% of those in the
experimental group and 27.8% of controls reported having
restrictions in their home at 12 months (X2 (1, N = 38) =
3.97, p < .05). Counseling was effective in increasing
the proportion of homes with smoking restrictions among a
low-income, ethnically diverse sample of mothers.